


take all the hurt away from me

by Thesis



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alcohol, Alternate Universe - Season 8 Was Good, Background Pregnancy, M/M, Masturbation, Mutual Pining, Post Series, Romance, SHEITH - Freeform, background allurance, background hidge
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-09
Updated: 2020-08-09
Packaged: 2021-03-05 19:55:12
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 21,285
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25800943
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thesis/pseuds/Thesis
Summary: Shiro and Keith make a bet with the other paladins to see how long they can go without touching. You know, like bros. Shiro promptly realizes that he desperately wants to touch Keith. Not so much as bros.
Relationships: Keith/Shiro (Voltron)
Comments: 33
Kudos: 286





	take all the hurt away from me

**Author's Note:**

> 1) This is an AU where none of that Season 8 shit happened. Instead Honerva came and then... I don't know, Voltron fought her and won or something. Allura is fine and Shiro is fine and Curtis is also fine, he's just over there with his other social life. Don't worry about it.
> 
> 2) I've had literally this entire fic written for over a year just sitting there because I was never in the mood to write a final sex-scene and that's how I wanted it to end. But I'm tired of waiting and I'm not going to force it, so I may as well just post what I wrote. So please forgive the somewhat abrupt ending. I hope that the rest of the fic is satisfying enough to make up for this.

"– _That_ ," Lance says, interrupting his own sentence and gesturing wildly. " _That!_ "

Shiro follows Lance's gestures to where his hand is set on Keith's shoulder. He catches Keith's eyes, looking up at him with an eyebrow raised. Almost spitefully, Keith leans closer, and Shiro has to swallow a small puff of laughter.

"Oh, the hand thing," Hunk says, at the same time as Pidge says, "The shoulder thing."

" _Yes_ , the – how were you not understanding, earlier?"

"Earlier?" Shiro questions, but does not get an answer.

"I mean, all of us are a little handsy," Hunk says instead, diplomatically.

"It's true," Pidge says, casually seated sideways on Hunk's lap. "I think our boundaries are a little skewed after the mind-melds."

At everyone's insistence, Allura is seated in the visitor's seat beside him, and when Shiro looks back their way, he watches Lance's hand find her shoulder. Like instinct, she brings her own hand up to rest over his, neither of their eyes leaving Shiro.

He would bet money that neither of them had even realized they did it until Lance catches the pointedness of Shiro's gaze.

Lance frowns, and before Shiro can say anything, he says, "This is normal. We're _couples_."

Right. That.

Shiro feels his fingers twitch and wonders if Keith notices. He's afraid to look down to check, and draws his hand off of the younger man's shoulder as casually as he can manage. When it drops to his side, he feels the back of Keith's hand brush against his for a fleeting moment. 

Then Keith flinches away from the touch, as if burned by the sheer awareness of it. The younger man crosses his arms over his chest. "What about it? What do you even care?"

Lance shrugs, raising his free hand defensively. "I'm not the one who cares. The cadets are the ones that made a game out of it."

"They what," Shiro says.

"There are variations," Lance explains, clearly delighted, and counts them off on his fingers. "Like… Bingo, theoretical drinking games, a betting pool – that kind of thing."

Sounding confused, Hunk repeats, "Theoretical–"  
  
"–Because they can't actually drink during work," Pidge interrupts to explain, not looking up. "So they just keep tallies to pay out later."

Shiro runs his hand over his face. It isn't as soothing as he wanted it to be; his hand feels clammy. How did he not know about all of this? No, it's natural that they would hide it from the person in question, especially when he's their superior officer. And he wants to let everyone have their fun, even if it's at his expense. God knows they deserve it after everything. But…

What if it reaches Keith? (No, that's a moot point. It _has_ reached Keith.)

"Isn't that a little inappropriate?" Shiro asks, feeling helpless.

Keith interrupts before anyone can answer, his irritation washed away by confusion, "What are the rules? I mean – how do they play?"

"I'm also curious," Allura chimes in, but does not sound as if she really understands the implications to begin with. Then again, Keith doesn't seem to, either. His head is cocked to the side inquisitively. Shiro doesn't want anyone to explain, but it's too late now.

Lance beams. "Drinking game's the easiest one. Drink every time Shiro puts his hand on Keith's shoulder. Two drinks if Keith touches _Shiro's_ shoulder."

"Bingo is pretty self explanatory," Pidge picks up after him, but when Allura opens her mouth to ask, Pidge concedes to explaining anyway. "It's like a little grid where each point is a checklist item. And the goal is to check off all the things you see happen and fill out a full line of the grid. They've got stuff like–"

"–Me touching Keith's shoulder?" Shiro asks, dryly.

Pidge shakes her head, then leans back into Hunk's carefully waiting palm, smugly amused by Shiro's naiveté. "That's the free space. There's all kinds of other stuff."

"I'm not sure I want to know," Shiro mutters.

" _I_ do," Keith huffs. His brow is furrowed, lips drawn in a thin line. "Why does anyone care that much what we do? We're a team. Of course we touch. And – we're best friends."

Despite everything, it is still heartwarming to hear Keith call them best friends. It's enough to make a grown man's heart do a little flutter.

Or maybe that's just nerves from the line of questioning. Shiro is glad when Hunk is the one to respond, because his "Aww," is too sincere to make Keith bristle. Then Hunk adds, "I think they're just bored, honestly. It's something to be interested in and something to talk about. Boredom's kind of a double edged luxury, you know?"

"What about the betting pool, then?" Keith asks, and Shiro winces.

The world, or God, or maybe just Lance, takes pity on him. "Oh, uhhhh, you know," Lance says, dragging it out. Unfortunately, Lance is a terrible liar, and without a cover story prepared in advance, his strategy seems to just be stalling for time. "Juuuust, you know… Like… Things like… How, uh… How long you can… Go…"

Pidge swoops in to his rescue. "How long you can go without touching each other," she explains. Shiro does not miss the way her eyes dart to Lance, boring into him with an unspoken _you owe me_.

It's a testament to how much Keith trusts them all that he accepts this sloppy lie.

"Huh," he says, simply, like he is mulling over the idea.

The truth is, Shiro knows about the _real_ betting pool. He hadn't known about the apparent myriad of other games, but the betting pool had slipped. Leifsdottir had spoken about it just a little too loudly while Shiro was close enough to overhear, and Shiro has been trying to pretend it never happened ever since.

How was he supposed to face that? Was there something he was supposed to do to shut it down?

_"How long until Captain Shirogane and Keith kiss in public?"_

They aren't even kissing in _private_. They aren't a couple, they aren't in _love_ , so no one is winning _that_ betting pool any time soon. Shiro would like to think – it's fine for the cadets to gossip and theorize all they like. It's fine that they don't understand. Like Hunk said, boredom is a double-edged luxury.

It's human nature to wonder and to talk, and if Takashi Shirogane supports anything these days, it's human nature.

But he had wanted to keep that particular brand of gossip away from Keith. He isn't embarrassed, necessarily. He knows he isn't responsible for what other people say or do. He just hadn't wanted to make Keith uncomfortable. 

Too much of what they do is intimate. There are too many factors at play. Too much history, too many rescues, too many matching scars for them to live any other way. Shiro wouldn't trade it for anything, but he fears the day it gets buried away as childish or embarrassing. The day it's set aside as a remnant of the past. Someday, Keith will realize that there is an intensity to their friendship that does not make sense outside of war. The fear of losing Shiro will fade enough to let him step back.

What it really comes down to is this: It's one thing to have thin boundaries with your best friend – it's another when you're an out gay man. When your coworkers project that onto your friendships, whispering behind your back.

Even without a malicious bone in their bodies, Shiro can see how intrusive it could feel for Keith to be misunderstood so thoroughly, and with such confidence. Shiro trusts Keith not to see it as insulting. It isn't like that. But Keith values his privacy.

Besides, Shiro thinks, it may only be a matter of time before someone comes between them. He can't pretend that they'll both be bachelors forever, valuing their friendships above all else because they have no one else. He's had a couple of brief flirtations since the war ended, and he's _sure_ there must be dozens of girls that are head over heels for Keith. He's too wonderful not to love.

Pidge exchanges a look with Hunk, like Shiro's silence is making her nervous and she is seeking further back up.

Obedient, but sounding as genuine as ever, Hunk offers, "My money's on, like three days tops. Not that I'm actually in the pool or anything, but I don't think I've ever seen you guys go that long without touching."

"Sometimes I'm away with the Blades _for weeks_ ," Keith points out.

"We only count the days that you're in the same building." Pidge says, creating rules on the spot.

"Honestly?" Lance says, "I'm leaning towards one day."

Allura frowns. "I think it's a matter of whether or not they're trying. With a fair awareness of the bet, I think they could last an entire week."

Pidge pauses, looking alarmingly thoughtful. "Ah, but that makes it a participatory bet instead of an observational one. So then it's less about their subconscious habits and more about their will power."

"The observer effect," Hunk agrees.

"Well, that's a little different," Pidge bounces back, and he nods along.

When Shiro looks down, Keith is holding his chin in his hand, his violet eyes set intently on the edge of Hunk's desk. Apparently he is not nearly as insulted by their lowball expectations. Shiro watches the thoughtful part of his mouth; the way his index finger brushes against his bottom lip, threatening to slip into his mouth.

With utmost seriousness, Keith concedes, "I could go two weeks."

Shiro blinks. "Only two?"

If this were even a _real_ game that the cadets were playing, Shiro would want to argue that they could go indefinitely. It isn't _hard_ to keep your hands off of someone, even for a tactile person. And Shiro does not consider himself or Keith to be particularly tactile people.

Keith glances up and his mouth quirks into a smirk, lips still pressed against the side of his finger. "You'd forget."

Shiro frowns. "I would not."

When he looks back up, Lance is still grinning at them. "Well then. Looks like you know what's up. The bet is on for how long you can go without touching."

"Twenty dollars," Hunk says. "I'm doubling down on three days."

Pidge gives them a calculating look, the light catching on her glasses. "Twenty from me. I'm on eight days."

Allura says, "If Keith has confidence in two weeks, then I'll trust Keith. Is twenty a reasonable amount? Earth currency is still… Small…"

Lance shrugs. "Sure. Then I guess we're all in for twenty. I'm saying…" He squints at them. "Four days."

Keith cuts off any protest Shiro had been about to give. "What if we last longer than that? Then _we_ win, right?"

"That seems fair," Hunk says. "I mean, if you're going out of your way."

"I'm starting the timer in like two minutes," Pidge announces. "Get all your touching in."

Shiro feels overwhelmed, suddenly, by how quickly this stupid joke, this cover-up excuse for the rumors he wants to hide from Keith, has escalated. But he glances around the room at all of his friends, each with the same amusement twinkling in their eyes. He doesn't have the heart to complain.

It's just a game. Besides, maybe it'll shut the cadets up. Give them less to talk about. Take some heat off of Keith.

Allura sounds deeply concerned for the two of them as she whispers, "That's so little time to prepare..."

Lance snorts. "What, do they need to strategize?"

Provocation from Lance always flips the switch with ease, and Keith's eyes are set with determination. But when he meets Shiro's eyes, he relaxes immediately, offering a small laugh.

"This is stupid," Shiro says, but can't stop himself from laughing, too.

"One for the road?" Keith asks, opening his arms.

It's easy to hug Keith.

That's the thing about touching Keith. It has never been sparks or fireworks or nerves – they're best friends. The way they touch has always been natural. It took time, took warming up to, and then it was just there, just a part of them. Together, they just were.

They don't even hug that often, but somehow knowing it will be their last for some time makes Shiro overly conscious of it. He feels Keith's chest, solid against his. He feels the shape of his arms wrapped around him; feels the cut of his shoulder blades beneath the jacket, beneath the bodysuit. And beneath his own hands.

Shiro thinks of the real bet. Of the real misconceptions that are being pushed onto Keith, and begins to draw back.

But Keith squeezes him tight, as if he wants to get every drop of enjoyment out of the moment that he can. Shiro hears him breathing in deep. He relaxes back into the embrace, doing the same. Keith's hair tickles his cheek, and Shiro thinks of how tall Keith has grown, how broad his shoulders are, now. Keith arches against him. His fingers press hard, holding Shiro's waist, and that's new, that's– 

–A loud beep, and Pidge's voice. "Time."

Keith steps away. Shiro half expects Pidge to call out the way they linger, the way Keith's fingers come back to drag along Shiro's forearms, flesh and metal, before they finally separate at the fingertips one last time.

"Fifteen days," Keith says, like he is psyching himself up for it. He looks up to Shiro and grins. "What should we do with the prize money?"

"I'll be happy just having my cadets' respect," Shiro jokes. He knows he has it, their voyeuristic gossip aside.

Keith nods with a smile, and then his gaze slides from Shiro, the same way his fingers had slipped away. The absence is oddly cold.

Shiro is already hyper-aware of the two feet of space that's pooled between them, but rolls his eyes at the thought of taking any of this seriously. 

***

In the morning, Shiro runs into Keith in the cafeteria. It is nearly empty at this hour. It's a sterile sort of quiet, and his boots on the linoleum give him away. Keith glances up and smiles a greeting.

Shiro catches himself about to slip into the seat beside Keith, but at the last minute remembers the bet and moves to sit across from him instead. He has to be careful, angling his legs so that they don't knock knees under the table. Keith is taller now, after all, after the time-slip he spent away from them.

It makes Keith laugh lightly, like they are both in on a joke, before he returns to looking over his tablet.

For a while, Shiro just watches Keith in the silence.

With his head bowed, Keith's eyes are nearly hidden by thick lashes. His voice carries through the empty room when he finally says, "The Blades are thinking of setting up a new off-planet base. One that's more, ah… Accessible than the old one."

It blindsides Shiro completely. "What?"

"We can't stay here," Keith murmurs without looking up, raising a hand to tuck hair behind his ear. "We're a hands-on organization, you know that. And we're recruiting more and more. Now that we're public, we need a headquarters people can get to."

Keith's hair has grown a bit too long, Shiro thinks. Keith's quiet embers are still _so_ warm, Shiro thinks. And the Blades, Shiro thinks, of course, the Blades. Accepting new members, shifting their focus to humanitarian issues. How wonderful, Shiro thinks, how admirable.

He desperately does not want to think about Keith vanishing into the stars without him. He remembers that Keith would have given up the knife for him, and now… No. It doesn't matter. He's a grown man, he's too old to be clingy like this. He's never been like this before, never had trouble letting people go. Maybe the shock of panic is small, maybe it only feel big because it is foreign to him.

"Shiro?"

Shiro blinks, reality coalescing back around him. Keith is reaching across the table, hand frozen in mid air with a delayed realization. He draws back without comment, relaxing back into his seat and raising an eyebrow at Shiro.

"I – oh." Shiro manages. "That's probably going to take some time, right?"

"A while," Keith concedes, but it doesn't do enough to wash away the helpless pit in Shiro's chest.

Before Shiro can ask for more details, Keith's tray slides across the table. There's still half a plate of food left. When Shiro looks up from it, Keith is standing, pushing off from the table with both hands.

"Eat something," he says, sternly.

Belatedly, Shiro realizes he hadn't gotten himself breakfast yet. "Okay."

Keith watches him a moment longer before repeating, "Okay."

He leaves, and when the echo of his footsteps has faded away, the silence reminds Shiro of being a student. It feels like an eternity ago, and it's often hard to reconcile what it was like. All those years of telling himself 'patience yields focus,' as he rushed his way through every achievement he could, racing a clock, leaving everyone that he could behind.

And now, finally, there really _is_ time to be patient. All the time they need to rebuild, together. With Shiro here, on Earth, waiting for when Keith comes back. Role reversals are a bitch, it turns out, but Shiro shakes off the thought and reminds himself that it's silly to compare the dynamics of old lovers to the dynamics of best friends as if they are equivalent.

The winter-morning dark ebbs away like a low tide. Shiro eats, listening to the yawning cadets slowly filter into the empty cafeteria, nodding back to the lazy salutes from the ones who have gotten far too familiar. Fine. There are some comforts in military structure, but there is also a level of its rigidity that Shiro could do without.

Then the morning dissipates into another long day of work.

It's easy to forget something as silly as a bet. Shiro is as busy as ever. Recreating any kind of coherent government takes a lot of paperwork, and that's not even factoring in the _changes_ they want to make.

Thinking about it that way is a thrill. They can make things _better_. Not just allowing Earth to become an intergalactic hub, but arranging the laws of the land in a way that hurt less people than they used to. Using the knowledge they have to make something _new_ , to make something catered to _modern_ reality.

So many systems made to benefit dead men are broken now, and Shiro gets to make their replacement. He gets to make a world for the future generations.

The paperwork is, admittedly, less thrilling than the concept.

He's grateful, he is, and he loves his work, he _does_ , but God it can be dull.

At least it brightens his day a little to get a message from Keith in the afternoon.

Shiro is resting with his head propped up on his hand, his lips pressed to his own palm. It muffles the sound of his own startled laughter. Of course it's easy when they're buildings away from each other.

Keith  
  
This bet is easy.  
  
It's been less than a day.  
  
It's been twenty years since breakfast. Don't lie to me.  
  
You should learn to stay away from those time slips.  
  
I'm trying to outgrow you.  
  
Anyway I'm dying.  
  
Back to work.  
  
Aye aye.  
  


He wonders if Keith is using their messages as a way to put off his own work. He doesn't even know what Keith is supposed to be doing, today. The Atlas, the Galaxy Garrison, the Voltron Coalition, and the Blade of Marmora are all tied so closely, but when it comes down to it, Shiro leaves Voltron to Allura and the Blades to Kolivan. He has his hands full just trying to recreate the concept of government on a universal scale.

Somehow, the thought of Keith struggling to work just like he is encourages him to buckle down. Even if he does keep pausing to text Keith. Even if he is preoccupied, refreshing his email every other minute to see if there's official word yet from the Blades about what, exactly, their plans are.

***

On the second day, the update finally comes. Their new base will be near Daibazaal, and they're already in the process of gathering materials to build. It's fitting, Shiro thinks. The galra rebellion turned humanitarian organization will make its new base on the ashes of the empire.

It's a good spot. There's a rough blueprint already, another of Slav's designs, and from the looks of things, they'll have an easy time warping wherever they need to.

The list of members and ranks scrolls by in Shiro's mind. He reads it so intently that he sees names and statuses when he closes his eyes, until he finally finds what he was looking for. Confirmation.

Keith will be leading his own team. Keith will be leaving the Atlas. Leaving Earth.

Shiro does not know how to interpret the feelings that crash at his edges, but he knows that pride is one of them. He decides to focus on that one.

It's why he very nearly claps a hand on Keith's shoulder the next time the younger man comes to his office.

Keith ducks away from Shiro's hand, snatching a bundle of papers from Shiro's fingers and taking three rapid steps backwards. It's graceful, in a way; the result of training that he doesn't talk about. The proof of the invisible ways that Keith works himself to the bone. Shiro thinks he deserves more praise for this sort of thing.

Keith's eyes narrow, set on Shiro accusingly. "You forgot."

Shiro opens his mouth, but cannot come up with even a joke of an excuse. Keith is right.

The stern expression fractures. Keith's eyes scrunch up when he laughs, his head bowed forward. "I told you you'd forget," he teases.

It feels impossible to imagine him like this a year ago. Keith has never been as serious as people mistake him to be – but Shiro can acknowledge that it wasn't always so easy to draw out his friendly side. The easy smiles are nice to see.

Of _course_ he's destined for greater things than sitting down in a grounded ship and rebuilding a government. Of course he is.

Shiro's eyes are drawn to the curve of Keith's raised shoulders; to the neckline of his bodysuit beneath his unbuttoned jacket. To his collarbone and the lines of his throat.

Of course he is.

"You should button up your jacket," Shiro says.

Keith raises an eyebrow. "It's not cold. Allura's the one with the weird temperatures, lately."

It's true; the desert isn't exactly frosty, even in the winter. Shiro nods, letting this go and wondering where his mind is at.

Keith straightens up and tucks a strand of hair behind his ear, and Shiro thinks about doing it for him. Keith's eyes meet Shiro's, and something like guilt shoots through the man. It's Keith, he reminds himself. It's _Keith_.

But Keith smirks at him, tilting his head back and looking down his nose at Shiro in a way that almost makes him expect a wink to follow. It does not, of course, but it still strikes Shiro as strangely… Flirty.

That is not a word he has ever expected to use on Keith.

"If you're done laughing at an old man's poor memory," Shiro says, clearing his throat and trying to clear his mind.

Keith snorts at the joke. "You're not _old_ , Shiro. You're not even thirty."

"Says the kid who's been calling me old timer for years."

Shiro regrets his words immediately, regrets the whole line of joking, but can't quite place why. He knows he'll feel better when Keith rolls his eyes, but he waits, and it doesn't come.

Instead, Keith sniffs, looking defensive. "I'm not a kid anymore," he says, a crossing his arms over his chest. "And I haven't called you that since I was."

Shiro bites the inside of his cheek. Feeling off balance around Keith is unfamiliar. "I know," he says. "I wasn't trying to be condescending. I'm sorry. I know that you're an adult now – and I… Also know you probably hate me saying it like that."

Keith is scanning his face for something, and Shiro doesn't know what. "You don't have to be so…" He trails off, his lips pursing tight. He shakes his head. "Never mind."

"What is it?"

Keith hesitates. Shiro wishes there was something he could do to comfort Keith, and it's a hollow feeling to know that there isn't.

When words failed a touch never did, but he has to settle for waiting patiently.

"You don't have to mediate," Keith says, but doesn't seem satisfied with the words. "You don't have to be both sides of a conversation like I'd misunderstand you, otherwise. I'm never going to assume the worst of you, Shiro."

Shiro's instinct is to say, _You're right,_ and follow up with something to acknowledge what he's done and how Keith must feel about it – to make sure Keith can tell he understands. At least he has the sense not to do this. In its own way, that would be condescending too, and Keith is clearly feeling some kind of sensitive to it, today.

Shiro can't fault him. Everyone has moods. (And God knows Keith's are nothing compared to Allura's, lately.)

"You don't have to play team captain when it's just us," Keith elaborates. It almost sounds like a question. Then his expression slips into irritation, apparently at himself. "I mean, I know you technically _are_ still higher ranked than me… And I _am_ proud of you for that, so it's not like I'm trying to undermine your authority or be disrespectful or anything… But…"

Shiro raises an eyebrow. "You don't have to have both sides of this conversation to make sure I'm not offended, Keith. I get it."

The self-depreciating smile they mirror at one another puts Shiro at ease.

Keith breathes out, his features smoothing, and Shiro feels his own tension ebbing away in turn. "Sorry," Keith mutters. "I don't know…"

Shiro feels like he gets the gist. "I never want us to feel distant. But it makes sense that we might feel a little out of rhythm when we're changing the way we interact."

This is the farthest they've stood to have a conversation with one another in as long as Shiro can remember. He wonders if it's the bet or the Blades, but _wants_ to believe that it is the former.

He wants to believe that the blame is on something temporary.

***

Shiro hates inter-planetary meetings.

He doesn't mind taking charge and steering conversation, but the attendees tend to be impatient. As if they think that everything brought up in the meeting will be solved during it, when really it's just problems for the drawing board. The recovery of the universe is as slow as it is vast. Shiro is sympathetic, and even appreciates how eager they are. It's still tiring to keep them realistic.

Between Allura's tact and Pidge's quick thinking, they always manage to keep from making enemies, at least.

Shiro is mid-sentence, explaining to an audience of alien diplomats what the role of the Atlas and the Galaxy Garrison are, and the way that they, along with the Voltron Coalition and the Blade of Marmora, are all separate, but deeply entwined entities. He should have asked for more briefing on what the other groups are actually _doing_ , but at least there is a representative from each one present.

He is explaining that they will never be completely independent from one another, explaining the way he has worked with each, the way _Keith_ has worked with each, when something moves at his side. He trails off distractedly, and hears Allura gracefully picking up for him right where he left off.

Keith is leaning away from Shiro at an almost comical angle. It takes a moment of staring at him to register _why._

His arm had drifted towards Keith as he spoke about him. Unconsciously, he had reached out to touch Keith's shoulder, as if to show him off to the ambassadors.

Shiro draws his hand back self consciously and does not miss the stray eyes of strangers that watch Keith straighten back up. He can't bring himself to really mind, even when Keith snickers under his breath and garners even more stares.

"Please excuse them," Allura says, her voice as melodious as always. Before the statement can sit long enough to earn an explanation, and before anyone can ask for one, she easily drifts back into a discussion of resource division and management.

She's glowing, Shiro thinks. He had always thought that was just something people said, but it's true. She has always been able to command attention, but there's something awe inspiring about her dedication to rebuilding another world after losing her own, even this far along. In moments like this, he almost thinks she is using it like a chess piece, but he doesn't fault her one bit. If anything, he only thinks it makes her more brilliant.

Keith waits until all the attention is off of them – until a moment when various ambassadors are leaning to their sides to whisper to one another during Pidge's graphic-heavy lecture.

"You forgot," Keith murmurs, pointedly keeping his eyes on the projection. Shiro should have known he wouldn't really get away with it.

"I didn't," Shiro whispers back, feeling somewhat affronted. "It was subconscious."

"Same thing." Keith pauses, then looks at him sidelong and says, "You're having a harder time with this than I expected."

Shiro is glad he does not get the chance to reply, because he is not sure what he could have said to that. Pidge's slideshow blinks off and the dimmed lights brighten again. Shiro sits up straight and tries to shake off any thoughts of the bet.

But he can't completely shake off the thought that occurs to him. That he is struggling and Keith isn't.

The epiphany that he is usually the one to initiate physical contact isn't inherently a bad one, but it fills him with a question that he doesn't have the words for. It's a sense of discomfort at the imbalance, and the feeling of it is so strangely close to disappointment that Shiro cannot comprehend it.

***

The fourth day of the bet passes without incident; Shiro spends most of the day babysitting Lance after he gets kicked out of Allura's check-up for fussing too much.

Shiro would feel bad for her, but he knows that Coran is still there with her. Besides, Shiro doubts that Allura particularly needs _any_ company for an ordinary check up.

Lance's frown is as deep as the crease between his brows, and he won't stop pausing mid-bite of his lunch to stare mournfully into the distance, often sighing dramatically.

"You'll live," Shiro tells him, flatly.

"You don't understand," Lance says dramatically, shaking his head, but fails to explain _what,_ exactly, Shiro does not understand.

And yet, Shiro has to concede that this he is probably right, anyway. Lance is good at picking up on things like this, and when Shiro thinks about it, he has usually been the one waiting _inside_ of the hospital, not out. He cannot count how many hours, days, _weeks_ he has spent sitting in hospital beds and waiting for visiting hours.

He's never thought too much about what it's like from the other side. (Except for maybe after he watched the lions fall. He is pretty sure his heart had skipped, then stopped, and sometimes he looks at Keith and it skips again.)

He thinks better of voicing that downer.

"Can I ask you something?" Lance asks. Some kind of expression must have flashed across Shiro's face because Lance adds, quickly, "Relax, man. As a friend, not a mentor."

"Sure."

"Do you think we're rushing into this?"

It's a heavy question, even if he isn't here for guidance. Shiro settles on simple honesty. "I don't think it's really my place to make that judgment, so I haven't thought about it."

Lance nods as if that was what he had expected to hear and says, "Allura spent the better part of the war believing that she was one of the last two Alteans alive. It's not like – either way it's not like we _planned_ this, but… It's kind of comforting, right? This kind of thing; this is exactly what I meant when I said that Keith is the future."

Shiro blinks, unsure of how Keith fits into any of this outside of his own tangential thoughts. "Keith is what?"

Lance blinks back. "Oh. I always forget you weren't there for that." After a moment of Shiro staring at him blankly, Lance explains. "The gameshow with Bob. We had to choose one of us to leave and I chose Keith. Partly because I don't think he would survive anywhere without you, but I also thought he's like… What things can be like, without the war. With a whole universe out there for us humans to fall in love with. And now me and Allura, we're going to bring that into the world, too. Someone who exists because different people from so far apart can come together and fall in love."

Shiro wants to question the first part of that reasoning, but can't bring himself to focus the conversation on himself. This isn't about him. It's about Lance, right now, nervous, or maybe just wanting to air out his thoughts.

Lance is ever the romantic, but only sometimes this articulate, so Shiro gives him room to carry the thought. He always does best when he can sort things out for himself.

"I remember that, like… Before all this, before we even left Earth, Veronica had been complaining that all her friends were getting pregnant or getting married. Or both, in that order. She kept saying they were dropping like flies, one by one, like she was worried she'd get… I don't know, _drafted next,_ you know? I agreed with her at the time. I was a teenager, and it was like – why would you want to get tied down to someone when you're both so young? When you could just keep things casual? But after meeting Allura, and being in the lions together, it's like… How could you not? How could you not hold onto the person you love as tight as humanly possible?"

"We're all a bit handsy, after the mind-meld," Shiro repeats, remembering what Hunk and Pidge had said the other day.

"We are. We are, and I guess I was just thinking about the stupid bet, and about how much I would hate it."

Shiro raises an eyebrow and tries to lighten the mood. "Are you only saying that because you're already out of the running?"

Lance doesn't take the bait, even though he grins at the prodding. His grin fades, but his eyes stick on Shiro's face with far too much understanding in them.

"I'm saying it because you're not stupid, Shiro. You know what the real bets are. I said it's different because we're all couples, but I didn't mean to back you into a corner. I was just – trying to push you a little, you know?"

"Into what?" Shiro asks.

Lance sighs deeply and shakes his head. Shiro doesn't like how long the silence stretches before Lance perks back up and says, "Never mind, man. Come on, I bet the check-up is over, and I can go apologize properly."

The two of them toss their trash and head back towards the medical bay together.

When Shiro pats Lance's back as they part, he expects some sort of latent satisfaction to bubble up in him. Some kind of gentle soothing of the rumbling impatience that's been inside him since the beginning of the bet. He is desperate for touch, isn't he? On edge without it.

It feels… Fine. It feels like patting Lance on the back.

Nothing more and nothing less, and the impatience hasn't dulled for a second.

***

Shiro _really_ doesn't consider himself a tactile person. He doesn't avoid touching, but he doesn't tend to seek it out, either. Sure, he does fine in social, leadership positions, but when it's time to mingle he tends to sequester himself to a far wall.

There is a part of him that has ached for touch like a starving man aches for food, but he chalks that up to his time spent without a body, and doesn't like to give himself room to indulge it. It's a response, not a trait. Besides, he doesn't even know _how_ to indulge it. Touching his friends does not seem to quench that thirst. Whether it's giving Lance a pointed pat on the back or holding Allura's hand, he remains parched.

Maybe that's why all of this is on his mind so much. It's a matter of contrast.

Here he is. Five days into this silly bet and he is antsy as Keith wraps up an update on the Blades' recruitment processes. Shiro can't stop staring at the way Keith's narrow fingers curl around his tablet. From where his gloves end over his knuckles to the sharp joints of his fingers.

He is aware of his own fingers touching his own desk. Had they really touched each other that often, before this? Enough to miss it so deeply? Or is he just overthinking it, like becoming aware of your own blinking, your own breathing?

No, that's a bad comparison. Those are needs. He doesn't _need_ to touch Keith.

Shiro stands, then circles around his desk to take a packet of paperwork directly from where it's tucked under Keith's arm. Halfway to him, he realizes that Keith's eyes are tracking him, but it isn't with the usual amusement.

It isn't just his ordinary over-attentiveness. Keith looks anxious. The instinct to touch Keith overtakes him; he wants to sooth him the way he always has. He raises a hand to touch his shoulder.

It isn't the betting pool that stops him. This time it isn't an amused, knowing look from Keith that catches him dead in his tracks.

It's that Keith flinches.

Shiro's hand drops down. He watches Keith's expression flicker, mirroring Shiro's surprise at first, then turning into anger. Keith's head whips to the side, as if by avoiding Shiro's gaze, he could pretend it hadn't happened.

Shiro imagines brushing aside the hair that curls around Keith's neck. Soft enough not to make him flinch, showing him that he's gentle, guiding him to face him. (No, Shiro thinks. That's overly intimate, even for them. That isn't on their usual repertoire.)

"Are you alright?" He asks, reminding himself that he has never soothed Keith by touching his hair. That the impulse is bizarre.

Keith looks at him from the edge of his sight, refusing to face him. "I'm fine."

Shiro tries to be discrete when he takes a step away from Keith to give him space, but Keith is watching him closely.

Keith's brow furrows. "Don't do that," he says, sounding vaguely helpless.

Shiro gives him a moment. He is used to understanding Keith intuitively, and for once feels lost in space, instead. He ventures, "Do you want to talk about it?"

Keith shakes his head harshly. "No," he says. "It's nothing."

He hands over the paperwork, both of their hands carefully at opposite ends of the packet. For the bet, of course. For the bet.

Keith leaves in a hurry.

***

It doesn't go away.

Keith watches Shiro cautiously each time they're near. Shiro wishes he could believe that it is just the younger man being prepared to dodge when Shiro inevitably forgets about the bet again. Or when he decides the bet isn't worth it. A part of Shiro wants to keep his distance just to avoid the issue altogether, but he can't. Work won't allow it under the best of circumstances, and things rarely operate that smoothly.

A short network outage has Matt running Shiro back and forth to get details; it would be a waste for his crews and the Blade of Marmora to cross wires in their respective humanitarian efforts, and ultimately, Atlas is the go-between.

The first time Matt sends Shiro on an errand, it's an excuse to give Shiro a break from his own work. The concept of the Captain of the Atlas running small errands for a no-name rebellion leader is laughable.

Matt seems happier to be known as such, and sometimes this still surprises Shiro. Matt had always liked attention and heroics. But now he fades himself away from the spotlight. Maybe he doesn't like being thought of as an extension of his father or sister whose names are far too big.

Maybe it's just that he wants to be as proud of himself as he is of them, and this is what he's done and where he's found his work.

So Shiro allows it. Matt is a footnote of the Garrison and a footnote of the Atlas by choice. And by choice, Shiro allows Matt to boss him around for the day, no matter how obnoxiously he grins and gloats.

It's to let him stretch his legs under the guise of getting work done, at first. But by the fifth request for Shiro to run and grab a number or a coordinate from Keith, Shiro is pretty sure Matt is just fucking with him.

He still lets him.

No matter how many times Shiro knocks on Keith's office door, Keith still lights up when he sees him. Then leans far, far into the back of his seat when Shiro steps closer to his desk, as if he wants to sink back through it, through the wall, and into another room.

"What is it this time?" Keith asks, clearly amused. It occurs to Shiro that Keith doesn't even realize the way he's drawn back.

"I stopped listening," Shiro admits. He sets a piece of scratch paper down on Keith's desk. "But I made Matt write down everything else he needs for you to fill in so I can be done with this."

As much as he likes getting out of his own office and getting to see Keith, he _does_ have work to get back to, after all.

Keith looks over the paper, nods, and leans over it to begin filling in the information.

"Can we… Talk?" Shiro asks.

Keith pauses, but does not look up. He resumes writing. "Sure. Always."

"You finch sometimes. When I get too close to you."

Keith tries to sound teasing, but his answer comes at a slight delay. "I'm dodging you." With his head bowed, his hair hangs into his face. Shiro is struck by the impulse to thumb over the curves of his cheeks. Maybe just one. Keith's voice jars him from the thought: "You keep forgetting about the bet. I want to win."

"It's not just when I reach for you. And it's not just dodging. I know the way you move, Keith."

The way Keith's shoulders tense is a giveaway that he understands perfectly well. He does not respond.

Shiro has to bite his lip; all he wants to do is touch Keith, to comfort him, but he's struck with the realization that it might not _work_. His touch might not be a comfort to Keith. He thinks again about running his fingers over the scar on Keith's face and thinks he knows why.

"I'm sorry," he murmurs.

Keith looks up sharply. It sounds more like a threat than a question: "For what?"

Shiro sighs. "Keith."

"Shiro."

"I'm not going to force you to talk to me," Shiro presses, as gently as he can. He tries to keep the disappointment out of his tone. He isn't here to guilt-trip Keith for not wanting to explain himself.

Keith sets down his pen, his expression dropping into resignation. He sighs. "And I'm not trying to shut you out. It just doesn't seem… Worth talking about."

"You don't have to," Shiro reminds him. "But if you want to, you know I'm always here for you. I just…" Shiro considers leaving it at this.

He remembers _you don't have to play team captain when it's just us._ They're best friends, he reminds himself. Best friends talk to each other. He can't keep relying on the mind-meld of lions to help them close the gap when they don't put things into words. Not anymore.

"I want to make you feel better," he says. "And I guess I'm… Realizing that I don't know how to do that when I can't touch you."

Keith's eyes go soft. He leans forward, resting his arms on the surface of his desk, as if he wants to be just that little bit closer to Shiro. Or as if Shiro is projecting his desperation for that to be true. One of those.

When Keith doesn't speak up, Shiro continues. "I understand why. Well enough to not read into it too much. It just worries me if me touching you only makes you feel worse. If it's always been like this."

Shiro has faced his own trauma blooming back into his insides too many times, watered by too many sources, to think this changes how Keith really thinks of him. Shiro doesn't hate purple lights; the glow of them is as familiar as the black lion's cockpit. But they are also as familiar as an arena, as a holding cell. As handcuffs and untreated, bleeding wounds. There are a lot of things that Shiro does not hate that can still send a deathly chill up his spine.

He wishes that he didn't, but he remembers the feeling of pinning Keith down with a blade to his face. He knows better than to think this has changed how Keith thinks of him. But maybe it's changed how he feels when he's touched.

Keith looks far too earnest for Shiro to doubt him when he says, "It always makes me feel better."

He only wishes Keith's gaze didn't dart away right after.

But valiantly, Keith continues. Visibly struggling, brow furrowed, he says, "Just… I tense up. I remember." Shiro opens his mouth, but Keith rushes to interrupt him, "And I'm over it. I am. But it's like my reflexes… Aren't. Or… Something like that."

"Okay," Shiro tells him. He wonders how many times he has made Keith uncomfortable without even realizing. It feels like an earth-shattering revelation. How could he have not known? "That's okay."

"It's not usually like this. It's – this is recent."

"Yeah?" Shiro tries not to look skeptical, and the way Keith reclines back in his seat with his arms crossed over his chest makes him think he's failed.

Keith tilts his head back and looks up at the ceiling. Maybe it's a comfort not to have to look at Shiro. For Shiro, it's a comfort to look at Keith, until he catches his gaze drifting down the length of his exposed neck. This keeps happening, and Shiro resolutely does not know why.

"I don't know," Keith says. "Maybe it didn't happen before because we were touching all the time. It's only been happening now that we're not. Nightmares and stuff."

Shiro has to imagine that gravity is a physical barrier around him. He has to will himself still, will himself not to reach out. Not to make Keith uncomfortable in exactly the way they are talking about right now.

"You're having nightmares?" He asks, feeling almost out-of-body.

Keith slumps forward again, grabbing his pen and returning to Matt's questions. He's not very good at being evasive. He doesn't usually need to with Shiro, and it's a sobering thought that he thinks he has to, now.

Shiro chooses his words carefully. "I know how that is. You know I do. You've seen me freeze up, you've seen me have panic attacks."

"That's different," Keith says, defensive, but not of himself.

"It's not. It's trauma."

Keith has run out of blanks to fill in on the paper, but doesn't look up or set down his pen.

"Keith, it's not just us anymore. We're not just alone in the void. The Garrison covers therapy for all of us. If you ever want to talk to _someone_ –"

"–I only like talking to you."

Shiro's gaze had been intent on Keith's fingernails, but his eyes snap up to meet Keith's. There's something about Keith, something crushingly sincere. It's part of why people get those misconceptions that the two of them are more than friends. He admits things like this with ease, and they are heavy words to present so lightly.

As nice as the thought is, Shiro sighs. "Everyone has their own excuses for why they don't need therapy, but believe me, we all need it."  


Keith arches an eyebrow at him. "Then I take it _you're_ talking to someone?"

Shiro knows better than to shoot himself in the foot by answering. He looks away, and hears Keith puff out a laugh.

The brief silence soothes the tension in the room. It makes it easier for Shiro to admit, "I think it's comforting for me, too. Touching all the time."

Keith's breath catches.

"I use it to reassure myself that I would never hurt you."

"Me too," Keith says, softly.

"Is this bet worth it?" Shiro asks, and hears the longing in his own voice. He realizes this question is too intimate. Ridiculous for something so silly, something childish to pass the time and laugh about with their friends.

But it's Keith, and his scale for intimacy has never been normal. He does not seem to think anything of it. "I don't know," he says, sincerely. "It's only, what, a week longer? I think we can manage. I do still want to win. Victory or death or whatever."

Shiro snorts.

Keith slides the paper over the desk towards him. "I'll quit if you want to."

But Shiro just shakes his head. "No, we can do it. Just… Communication, yeah?"

Keith smiles, much too radiant to be sitting at a desk and doing paperwork. "Yeah."

***

Shiro dreams about it, too. He dreams about free falling through the stars, at first, but it isn't fun like those dreams used to be when he was a child.

He crash lands on a burning satellite. The air knocks from his lungs as his back bounces off hot metal with a reverberating _crack_. He scrambles, struggling to find purchase on the smooth surface and within his own body.

In the way of dreams, it changes. By the time Shiro manages to get upright – rolling over and pushing up onto his hands and knees – Keith is pinned beneath him. Grimacing, trembling like he is frozen to the bone amid the sparking flames that don't belong. He stares up at Shiro with the most devastated expression Shiro has ever seen on a man, and this is what's terrible about the dream.

The fire and flames and the ache of his body hadn't really been there at the time. But that expression had been real.

When Keith speaks there is no sound, only the heated hum of Shiro's sword, the sizzle of his skin beneath it, and the creaking of metal.

Shiro wakes up in a cold sweat and knows exactly what those words were.

_You're my brother._

_I love you._

Shiro has never doubted Keith's love. He has never really questioned it, either. Keith is far too sincere for that, and Shiro thinks this is exactly what other people misunderstand about him. People see romance where there is none, because they cannot fathom a person being so earnest for anything less.

But a platonic love is not lesser than a romantic love. It's just different. Keith loves Shiro the way Shiro loves Keith. Without any want for more. Satisfied and comfortably.

That does not make it any less intense a feeling. It is _overwhelming,_ sometimes, just how deeply Shiro loves Keith. Maybe it would be less consuming if he didn't have such vivid memories of hurting him. Those memories carry their own kind of heartbreak and make it impossible not to linger in a place between guilt and gratitude. The mixture of protectiveness and pride is a dense miasma to breathe.

Shiro is used to the cold of military showers, but today he keeps the water hot. He needs the distraction from the nightmare memory, needs something to keep him from shivering.

He is still shirtless, drying his hair, when there's a knock on his door. He doesn't have time to answer before Keith lets himself in.

For a moment, Keith just stares at him, looking vaguely mystified.

Shiro fails to hold back a small laugh. Keith is usually a morning person, but apparently today he is still spacy.

It snaps Keith out of it. He blinks. "I – uh. Morning. Kolivan wanted me on a mission with the Blades. Short notice, but they need an extra set of hands. I wanted you to know before I left."

"That's… _Really_ short notice," Shiro observes. Keith would have just told him in the office otherwise. Shiro doesn't remember where the Blades are right now, but he can look into the details later. They're always on top of their check-ins and reports. If something is this last-minute, it must be for good reason. "How long do you have?"

"Like a minute," Keith says, and looks antsy enough for Shiro to believe him. He's already in the Blade uniform; the contrast of its black against pale Atlas walls makes the cut of his calves and his broad shoulders dramatic.

Shiro sets down the towel and pulls his undershirt over his head. He frowns. He realizes that " _good reason_ " probably means _danger_.

He wants to hug him good-bye. It is fleeting, but the thought crosses his mind: If anything happened to Keith – if the last time he sees him is _this…_ Stilted and held back for the sake of a stupid joke between friends…

His nightmare is still weighing down his mood. He has never been an optimist, but this is a dark line of thought, even for him. He tries to shake it off.

Keith shifts his weight from foot to foot.

Deprived of touch for so long, the longing for it is intense. Shiro thinks of his fingers curling over Keith's shoulder. He watches Keith's weight fall to one hip, watches the balance of his whole body and the way he cocks his head to match. His hair curls around his cheeks and his throat, and Shiro will never understand how he makes a hair style born of laziness look so decidedly handsome.

"Maybe…" Keith begins, but trails off. Shiro gives him a moment to articulate the thought, but instead Keith just shakes his head. "Never mind. I've gotta go, I just wanted to see you first."

Shiro's heart beats out of rhythm. He tells himself it was just a dream, he tells himself it _was_ the dream.

"Come back in one piece."

He feels as if there was something more he had wanted to say, but he can't put his finger on it.

***

Life continues on. Slow and busy – slow _because_ it's busy. Shiro gets a proper update from Kolivan about the mission. It's nothing too alarming, just more pirates than they had expected in the region – which meant more supplies that needed moving, preferably by someone with combat training, just in case.

Keith is only away for four days. He's been away for _much_ longer stretches. Shiro counts the days, and does not much care for the knowing look Matt gives him.

"You know," Matt tells him, one day. " _My_ crew were thinking of setting up an off-planet base of operations."

Shiro looks up from his work. Takes a sip of his coffee. Wonders how Matt has the free time to loiter in his office and sit on his desk. "That would be good," he says.

Matt huffs, crossing his arms and leaning close. "Wouldn't you miss me?"

"Of course," Shiro says, blinking. "I'm sure Pidge and Sam would, too. Everyone would. But if that's what you think is best – I bet you could accomplish so much out there. Depending on location, it could make your whole crew way more efficient, and even give you more freedom to grow beyond what you are now. It's almost a waste to keep you based somewhere like Earth. We're a beacon, but we don't need to be _everyone's_ base of operations."

Matt leans back away from Shiro, sniffing and looking decidedly like a pouty child. "What do you think about the Marmora base?"

Shiro looks back to his paperwork and wills his expression blank. He hears the way his own voice comes out terse in his effort to keep it even. "It's a good idea, too."

Matt buries his face in his hands. "My dude. Come on."

Whatever point Matt had been failing to make is cut off by Axca knocking at his office door. She lets herself in, and the hesitancy of her steps has Shiro feeling anxious in seconds flat. Axca is not one for nerves.

"Keith is back," she says. The room is quiet. Shiro realizes he is holding his breath, waiting for the bad news he knows is coming. Axca looks at Matt almost helplessly, as if she does not want to be delivering this news to Shiro, then says, "He's in the med bay. He's _fine._ All patched up. 'All in one piece,' he said."

Shiro pushes up from his desk and leaves so quickly that he only realizes halfway to the med-bay that he forgot to thank Axca or say goodbye to Matt. Or to invite either of them to check on Keith with him.

He makes note to apologize to them both later, but it's easy to dismiss the social misstep from his mind. He wants to run all the way there. It feels like his mind is screaming with every carefully measured step he takes down the halls.

He's already decided to touch him, today. Fuck the bet. Fuck the money. Fuck the cadets and fuck whatever they think, even. It doesn't matter in the face of something like this.

Keith got hurt, and all Shiro wants is to feel for himself that he's still warm and breathing. He wants to feel that he's here, because what if some day he isn't? Shiro has lived his whole life knowing he's the one who would die first and leave everyone behind, but now that it's not true anymore – God, the alternative is terrifying when he gives it more than half a second's thought.

Shiro stands in the doorway, frozen for a moment as he and Keith assess each other in silence. Shiro knows he must look disheveled despite his best efforts. At least Keith looks fine, sitting up in the hospital bed. Perhaps his eyes are a bit unfocused from the pain medication.

After a moment, Keith grins and lifts his bangs to reveal a small bandage on the left side of his forehead. "It really wasn't a big deal," he says. "Tiny cut, a little deep. Just a couple stitches." 

Shiro exhales the words, "That _is_ a big deal," but it sounds more relieved than it does exasperated. "Head wounds are always a big deal."

When Shiro steps up beside Keith's bedside, the younger man holds a hand up, laughing. "The bet."

Shiro's shoulders sag, but he forces a resigned smile. "Yeah?"

"Yeah," Keith says. His eyes scan Shiro's face, searching. "Right?"

Shiro can tell he's asking something else, but he doesn't know what.

Either way, there is something endearing in the stubbornness, and so Shiro swallows back his instinct to touch. He pulls a chair up to the side of the bed and sinks down into it with the weight of his world on his shoulders. He lets out a long, deep sigh, and tries to shake off his own worry. "Yeah, of course."

Keith laughs lightly, and Shiro pretends not to notice the way it turns into a wince. God, he wants to feel his skin. He wants to rest his hand over Keith's heart to feel the way it beats and make sure it's still strong and steady.

"I'm fine. Zethrid is just fussy," Keith insists. Then considers this, and adds, "Ironically."

Shiro isn't sure what to say to that. "Again, head wounds are always a big deal, Keith. Better safe than sorry."

Keith shrugs. "I didn't break anything and I barely even blacked out."  
  
"–What?"  
  
"Nothing."

Shiro buries his head in his hands, exhausted by the sudden drop of adrenaline. Fearing for Keith's safety, then seeing him like this is like being pushed off a steep cliff. And Shiro isn't allowed to grab hold for comfort.

With his hand still covering his eyes, somehow it's easier to admit, "I know that you can take care of yourself, but it's hard not being able to keep an eye on you. I don't like putting you in danger or seeing you in danger, but at least when we were on the _same_ team, I only had to deal with reality and not my own imagination."

In Keith's silence, Shiro is afraid to look up.

What he thinks is: Adam is dead. They weren't right for each other in the end and their relationship was over, but the fact of the matter is that Adam is _dead_ , and it makes Shiro wish he had been better. Makes him wish he had made more memories, tried harder, done something, _anything_ , to immortalize him.

People die out of sight.

He is terrified that someday Keith is going to be a name on a memorial, and all Shiro will have are regrets that he didn't hold him tighter while he could. This body isn't sick and the war is over and the Atlas is a desk job. It isn't _him_ that keeps running off into space to pick up the sharp and messy pieces of an overthrown empire with his bare hands.

Shiro exhales. Says, "Sorry. I don't mean to guilt trip you right when you get back. And when you're hurt."

He hears a sound – Keith shaking his head, he thinks. "I'm not offended that you worry about me, Shiro. But I _can_ take care of myself. And I'll always come back to you."

Shiro blinks. He drops his hand and looks up to Keith, vaguely startled to find violet eyes staring right back at him intently. As if it had been an observation of the weather. Like staring at dust in the desert, or red in the sunset. _I'll always come back to you._

The longer Shiro looks, the more he can see the effects of the pain medication on Keith. His gaze is intent, but his eyes are watery; his head tilts to the side just slightly. It seems like a concentrated effort for his gaze not to wander – but it doesn't.

"Shiro," Keith murmurs, but apparently was not leading anywhere with it.

Shiro's voice is caught in his throat. He doesn't know why. He doesn't even know what he wants to say.

Keith's eyes flutter shut. He leans back against the headboard, and winces, but the expression smooths over easily into a contented smile.

Keith's hand is resting beside him, palm up. Shiro thinks about reaching for it. If he can't figure out his own words, he could at least hold Keith's hand. At least spread some warmth between them.

"I'll let you get some rest," Shiro says, instead.

Keith opens his eyes, but his gaze stays low. He almost looks disappointed, staring down at the pool of white blankets over his lap. "Oh," he says.

"Do you want me to visit you tomorrow?" Shiro ventures.

Keith does not look at him. He looks out the window, and Shiro's eyes track over the too-wide neckline of the hospital gown. Keith's shoulders droop and he says, "I'll be discharged tomorrow, so don't worry about it."

Shiro worries he's upset him, somehow, until Keith finally looks at him and offers a smile. It sets him at ease enough that he can leave the medical wing without interrogating the nearest doctor.

***

The tenth day of the bet falls on a gala.

Shiro is still unclear if it's a celebration of Altean liberation from the colonies or if it's just a _very_ lavish baby shower. Either way, it's a nice change from the political meetings. Shiro never forgets that Allura is royalty – not when she is diplomatic and aggressively competent, but it's rare for her to get to play the part. It's rare for her to wear the dresses and be surrounded by starry-eyed guests and hundreds of gifts, like Shiro is convinced she always deserves to be.

It's nice. There is music and dancing, a buffet, and an open bar.

But if Shiro is honest, he still does not like parties. Shiro knows that his hyper vigilance isn't needed anymore. Security is much tighter now than it was on the Castle of Lions, population: seven and technology: haunted. He doesn't need to be on edge, to be on lookout.

Pacing the perimeter and avoiding socializing is probably doing more harm than good for his mental health. He needs to learn how to relax again.

After an internal debate with himself about the pros and cons of being inebriated and whether or not it would be a comfort, Shiro concedes to giving it a shot regardless. A literal shot – something from the bar that comes in a little, white-frosted glass. It's a vivid orange and feels more like mist on his tongue than liquid, but the taste is alright and it gives him a nice enough buzz right away.

He watches Allura drift between small clusters of guests spread across the floor. She moves so smoothly that it's like a dance, her pretty skirts flowing with her. Lance trails after her, looking perpetually self-conscious, but doing his best not to embarrass her. Smiling and shaking hands.

They are so young, Shiro thinks. Maybe this thought includes himself. He still has whiplash going from fighting a war alongside Lance and Allura and now… He knows the universe is in recovery, but even so a part of him can't help but ask: _Already?_

Shiro drinks his drink and thinks of it as a trauma response. There was no time to crash when they were in the middle of fighting, but now they have the time. Now it can catch up and all that desperation can hit them all at once. Maybe it was to reaffirm that they are alive, maybe it was just that love is the polar opposite of war, birth is the opposite of death.

Maybe it's fear that something will go wrong, that this is temporary, that they might lose their chance.

Shiro grappled with his own mortality and with being a prisoner of war on a different schedule than the rest of Team Voltron, so he feels at least _somewhat_ qualified to theorize about their mental states.

Then again, Shiro still isn't talking to a therapist when he knows damn well that he should be, so maybe he isn't 'qualified' for anything.

Maybe it was just a happy accident, and trying to read into it too much is stupid.

Keith snorts beside him, as if summoned by a self-depreciative thought to dispel it. Fondly, he says, "Lance is an idiot."

Shiro turns, startled by how silently Keith had apparently dropped into the seat next to him. If it were anyone else, Shiro would worry that he is already more inebriated than he had realized.

"I'm happy for him," Shiro says, sincerely.

Shiro had known the painkillers were making Keith woozy over the past few days, but nothing really brings it home like seeing him off of them. Keith's eyes are sharp as he watches Shiro with a smile. "Yeah. Me too. Don't tell him I said that."

"I don't have to."

Despite the jokes between them, Shiro knows that Keith has been open in congratulating Lance and Allura. Keith flushes and distracts himself by ordering a drink.

Shiro turns his body back towards the floor, but keeps his eyes on Keith, watching him at the edge of his sight. His hair combed back into a ponytail. His formal clothes somewhere between Altean and human. Red, of course. He always wears red around Shiro, but if he is being honest, Shiro prefers seeing him in black and purple. They're just more flattering on him, he thinks.

"So, what's your bet?" Keith asks, catching his eye. The red is still very handsome. Keith takes a long sip of something clear as water, but judging by the face he makes afterwards, very different.

Shiro ponders this. They're on ten days now. Only four left and they'll have won. He opens his mouth, but Keith interrupts.

"–Oh, I mean about the kid." He clarifies. "Girl or boy?"

"Lance wants a girl."

"Allura wants a boy, so if Lance gets his way, they'll just have to try again. I'm sure Lance will be devastated."

Shiro laughs and realizes from the strain of his cheeks that he's been smiling since Keith sat down beside him. "Getting laid regularly. What a curse."

Keith coughs, then silently downs the rest of his drink and orders another.

Resting at the edges of the event is nicer with Keith beside him. Like a switch is flipped in his brain that lets his shoulders finally untense. After Keith's mission with the Blades, his injury, and the days he has been scarce in equal parts work and recovery, it's soothing for Shiro to have him here. Right by his side, where he belongs.

Strangely, and this may be the alcohol speaking, but Shiro does not even think that it's entirely about Keith's conceptual safety. It's about his own, too. They go hand in hand – Shiro can watch Keith and keep him safe, and Shiro knows that Keith will protect him, too. He always has and always will.

After several rounds, and at a mild lull in conversation, Keith catches Shiro staring at Allura again and asks, "Do you want kids, someday?"

If there is one thing to be thankful for in all of this, it's right there. A simple, earnest question. The two of them don't keep secrets from each other, but there is also a way that Shiro thinks they both internalize too much, a way they do not even _think_ to discuss certain things.  
  
One thinks, _He'll tell me if he wants to,_ while the other thinks, _He'll ask if he wants to know._

Maybe when he learned Shiro was dying, he'd wanted to give Shiro the dignity of his secrets. Maybe he just hadn't wanted to be blindsided by a truth like _that_ again. That's what Shiro had assumed, and he had respected it, and never brought it up again.  
  
But Shiro thinks, now, that maybe when you know that someone would die with you before letting you die alone, you stop having secrets at all. Maybe when you know you're not dying first, there's no need to close so many doors.

"I don't know," Shiro answers, honestly. "I never really thought about it."

Keith is quiet, letting the answer hang in the air between them. It is not an uncomfortable moment, even though it's clearly put him at a loss for words. "Ah," he says, eventually.

Shiro is acutely aware of his fingers and the feeling of his empty glass in his hand. He looks down at it. "I didn't think I'd make it this far, so something like settling down or starting a family was never on my radar. And even now, it's hard to imagine. I'm always working."

Keith does not point out that for a man without settling down on his radar, Shiro had come awfully close to getting married to Adam. Shiro is grateful for his silence, but aches for the soothing hand on his arm, the unspoken _I get it_ pressed into his skin.

Shiro says, "I don't know if I ever want kids. Even just thinking about a relationship, it's still something that would have to be on the backburner."

"Yeah?"

Shiro does not think he would normally explain, and it might be the bet and it might be the alcohol, but there's this strange longing in his chest. A desire for being understood, maybe. A desire to be honest, even about difficult things, even about things he could be judged for.

Shiro is not ashamed of his priorities, but they have tanked relationships before and he's sure they will again. There's a nice safety in friendship – a friendship won't fall apart over these kinds of misaligned priorities.

"I don't balance my time well," Shiro ventures, cautiously. He almost expects Keith to scoff and agree, but the other man just watches him, patiently listening. "I value my work. I value my position in rebuilding what… Feels like _everything_ on Earth. I would rather work as hard as I do and for as long as I do than retire and leave it to someone else just as capable. So first and foremost, it's always going to be a matter of time."

Keith is smiling at him now, and his eyes that are usually so dagger-sharp have gone soft.

It makes it easier to continue. Shiro admits, "I don't know that my priorities would change, even if I found someone. I think it would still always be you."

Keith blinks.

"You, and Allura, and Lance, and Hunk, and Pidge," Shiro clarifies, after a moment of thought. "And then even everyone else - Matt, Sam, Romelle, all the Blades, and the Atlas crew… They're my priority. It's different from family, but it's still a kind of family."

Keith's tensed shoulders relax, and Shiro has to fight with every bone in his body not to touch the familiar curve of his arm. He is staring, he knows, taking in the sight fondly as Keith slouches back to rest his elbows on the bar counter.

"What about you?" Shiro asks.

Keith looks at him sidelong. "What about me?"

"Do you want kids someday? A family?"

"I like the idea of it," Keith admits, his head canting away from Shiro. Shiro can't help but admire his jawline and the curve of his throat, then immediately feels guilty for it when Keith murmurs a somewhat uncertain, "But I don't know."

"You've got time to figure it out," Shiro offers, tearing his gaze back to Keith's eyes.

Keith looks amused. "So do you."

"Hey," Pidge's voice interrupts the moment. She sidles up beside Keith with a wave. After surveying the empty glasses nearby and giving Shiro a long once over, she stage-whispers to Keith, "He looks drunk."

"We both are," Keith stage-whispers back.

Pidge adjusts her glasses and looks them over, clinically this time. "A fascinating decision," she says.

Shiro isn't sure what that's supposed to mean. When he gives Keith a once over, one of a hundred he must have given him tonight, he notes how close their knees are to touching.

Keith sits on the bar stool with his legs spread wide. Shiro thinks about the shape of his calves in armor versus the shape of dress-pants spread over his thighs. Shiro thinks about how easy it would be to touch his knee. His inner thigh, even, where the fabric is pulled tight and creaseless.

With the height of the bar stools and Pidge's short stature, she crosses her arms and rests them over Keith's thigh like it's nothing. Shiro feels his lips purse, but does not say anything.

"I mean, I'm already out of the bet," she drawls. She drums her fingers, dangerously close to Keith's inner thigh, and Shiro's frown deepens. He doesn't know why this bothers him, why he is suddenly acutely aware of the alcohol flush heating his face. "So feel free to give it up any time. I have to pay either way."

"But why would we want you to pay up to Allura instead of _us?_ " Keith asks.

"Yeah," Shiro interjects, trying to grasp the conversation.

The other two both look at him for a beat, openly amused, then look back to each other.

Keith has been matching him drink for drink. Shiro wonders why he seems so much more clear minded. Maybe it's just that Keith is so smart. Maybe it's that he isn't an ordinary human, maybe it's a side-effect of that beautiful part of him that's got violet starlight in his veins. Eyes that can glow gold, and those sharp, sharp teeth. Things that should be scary, but only push back against bad memories with firm and warm hands.

Pidge shrugs. "I dunno, aren't you supposed to pamper pregnant girls? That seems right. This _is_ basically her baby shower. Speaking of, did you get her anything good?"

"Did _you?_ " Keith asks, and Pidge shrugs. They all know that there is nothing they can give Allura that she couldn't get herself. "Besides, somehow I don't think sixty bucks is going to mean much to a galactic princess who still describes every Earth currency as 'small.'"

"Fair."

Keith says something else, but Shiro is not sure what it is because Pidge readjusts her arms and her fingers are lower on Keith's thigh. He hears Pidge point out, "He's slouching."

"His tolerance just isn't great. Never really drank much, before. I'll cut him off."

If it were anyone else, Shiro might be annoyed, being talked about like he isn't here. But Keith is good. Keith knows how to look out for him without looking _down_ on him. Keith is _so_ good.

Pidge examines him, and Shiro does his best to look sober. It must not work, because she leans her head back to ask Keith: "Want a break from the bet? One night, just to make sure he gets back to his room in one piece?"

Shiro opens his mouth to say yes, but hesitates when he sees that Keith's brow furrows. They've talked about this – he knows that Keith wants the touching back, too. So he doesn’t understand the hesitation, now.

Pidge shakes her head and pushes away from Keith before either of them can answer. "I don't actually think I have that kind of authority over the bet, anyway. Couple more days, you got this." She pauses. "Or you don't. I don't care anymore. But you've surpassed my expectations!"

"And we're very proud," Keith says.

Pidge laughs, then orders what Shiro desperately hopes is just a juice before disappearing back into the crowd with a wave.

***

Shiro is in his bed. He remembers the sounds of the party as it died down and he remembers the stark silence of the halls as he and Keith walked back here with a careful two feet of space between them.

There is a figure sitting at the edge of the bed, leaning over him without touching. Shiro wants him to. This close, he can feel the body heat. He can smell him, a distinct scent that Shiro can't put into words. Something vast and hollow, something dark and cold. But natural, too. Earthy, almost.

Sometimes the longing hits Shiro in the gut, like this. Sudden and overwhelming, he just _wants_ , and he thinks it's probably impossible to get what he wants. It's impossible to even _know_ what he wants.

The room is slowly breathing.

"Lightweight," Keith's voice says.

Shiro tries to deny it, but it comes out an incoherent mumble. He sighs, annoyed with himself.

"Don't worry, it's cute."

Shiro squints up at the shadows, trying to see Keith within the silhouette, but it's black on black in the darkness. "Touch," he says, and is not sure what the rest of the sentence was. If there was more to the thought at all.

Keith laughs lightly. "Two more days, Captain. You can do it."

"You're stingy," Shiro complains, but the fondness of his laugh blooms a warm into his stomach. He knows it can't be that late, but he feels exhausted, and his bed and blankets feel heavenly.

The bed creaks as Keith rises. "You'll thank me when all the rumors die down."

There's something wrong about these words, but Shiro can't place it. He closes his eyes and manages to will the spinning room to shift into gently pulsing walls. He hears the sound of the door sliding open, and the pause before Keith leaves.

***

He dreams of something warm and soft and smooth. A body against his, a comforting smell. The comfort around him feels more like home than his quarters do, more cozy. Like he belongs there, like it is his forever-home. Somewhere stable and perfect, somewhere eternal.

He dreams of purple stars shining above him and he thinks: those are me.

Then he dreams of the purple stars inside himself, too, and realizes that the ones above are not a part of himself. But there they are. A permanent fixture, a set part of reality. Dead stars that still reach him with their violet light, the same way that he would reach for them in death, too.

He dreams of that warmth against him, hard and hot. Fire, and the pleasant smell of smoke, like a camp fire under a vast night sky. A fire that doesn't burn him, a fire that burns inside of him. Sparks that turn into stars when they hit the sky and turn into hands when they touch his skin.

His whole body is heated up, tingling, blushed with a thrill of pleasure that he is too sleepy to comprehend until he wakes up.

Until he wakes up, hard under his blankets. Until he wakes up, already grinding against his mattress.

It is still the middle of the night. He is still pleasantly buzzed. He just wants relief, and then to go back to sleep, and so he shifts in place and reaches down to touch himself. He tugs his pants down. His fist wraps around his hard cock, and he exhales at the relief of it.

Shiro does not normally think of anything in specific when he masturbates. It's all conceptual. He thinks about the feel of his heavy cock in his own hand; he thinks of how it might look sinking into someone, stretching them open around him and hitting them deep. Just that idea sends a shiver up his spine.

He's never understood the idea of fantasizing about a specific person, or even specific scenarios, really. Even when he's had crushes, even when he's been in love. In relationships or out of them. There are just scattered ideas he likes. Images, positions, even words, but his mind never really works to tie them together into any kind of coherent fantasy. The concept of masturbating _to_ something or someone has always felt foreign.

In the midnight dark of his room, his hand strokes his length, slow and languid. He rubs his finger just under the head of his cock and thinks of a slender waist, and about running his hand over lower back dimples.

He closes his eyes, arching into his own touch, and pictures pulling a smaller body down over his lap, pictures the firm weight and warmth of a back pressed up to his chest. His fist emulates the rhythm of rolling hips as he imagines being ridden.

_That's it,_ his own voice murmurs, only in his mind. _That's it, baby, show me you want it._

He pictures the tensing of thighs over his, muscled calves locking with his own. Arched spine, and pretty black hair spilling over sharp shoulder blades.

He imagines a familiar voice's low grunts of exertion. Then, pitched higher, _Fuck, Shiro – Shiro._

He pictures him turning, twisting on his lap to kiss Shiro over his shoulder. Shiro arches his hips, thrusting into his hand with an increasing desperation. He snaps his hips up – pictures a jaw going slack with a silent moan, their tongues hot and wet against each other. 

God, it's been a long time since Shiro touched anyone at all. Since he got laid.

Since he touched Keith.

Shiro pictures his hand sliding down his spine, running across smooth skin and pushing at the curve of his back. He pictures guiding the other body, feeling every movement as he bounces on Shiro's cock with heaving breaths, obeying every push and pull.

_Fuck me,_ Keith moans. _Fuck me, Shiro, come inside me, I want–  
  
_–the fantasy fractures as Shiro comes, shattering into incoherency and then black-hole nothingness.

His heavy breathing is strikingly loud in his dark and empty room. His imagination is out the door and running, already too far away to grasp those images and hold onto them. It takes him a moment to come down from the moment.  
  
Oh, Shiro thinks, before going back to sleep.

_Oh_.

***

There's nothing wrong with being attracted to your friends, Shiro assures himself.

He feels as if he is working through a haze. Working on autopilot while his mind churns over - itself. It's his own mind that he's analyzing.

So. He's more tactile than he'd realized. At least when it comes to Keith. Okay. That doesn't have to mean anything. Maybe it's crossed wires. Wanting the friendly intimacy and his mind mixing it up for sexual desire. Sure. Why not?

God, he wishes he could believe his own bullshit.

Shiro has never believed in loving someone before you've truly been with them. Call it bleak, but he has never believed in the fairy-tale. You can't love someone before you know them, and you can't know them until they are already woven into your life. You cannot know that you are _in_ love with someone unless you know the way that _they_ love. Entering relationships is a gamble, like that.

Shiro had loved Adam, but not before they started dating. It had only been a crush, back when Adam was handsome and smart, and perhaps a bit too serious. But it wasn't love. Not until Adam was sarcastic behind closed doors and extra sweet on sleepy mornings. Not until Shiro had seen the sides of him that weren't a performance for the public.

But the thing is, Shiro is not sure there are sides of Keith he does not know.

He has been skirting around it all day. Denying it, explaining it, accepting it, justifying it. It's been an exhausting internal monologue.

Keith passes by his window and for once does not even glance in – he is laughing with Allura and Hunk. Hunk looks like he is complaining for just a second, but dissolves into laughter, ushering Allura and Keith on with a hand on each of their backs.

Against all historic evidence to prepare him, the pang of jealousy still catches Shiro off guard.

They pass by, and Shiro just stares out his window with an unfocused gaze.

Until Keith ducks back into sight from the edge. He looks startled to be met with Shiro's eyes on his immediately, but then breaks into a soft smile.

For the first time, the words crystalize in Shiro's mind, clearing out every other thought like a detonating bomb.

Keith waves – points after the others and makes absolutely incoherent hand gestures.

_I'm in love with you_ , Shiro thinks, helplessly.

Keith seems to realize that his gesturing isn't being understood and laughs at himself. Then his attention is caught by something Shiro can't see. He gives Shiro another wave before stepping out of view once more, mouth already moving to call out to the others.

Shiro buries his face in his hands, exhausted with the mental gymnastics he has been doing to avoid this clarity all day.

He's going to have to tell Keith.

***

Allura is in labor, and Shiro cannot remember how many days are left of the bet, or what he needed to tell Keith.

He holds Allura's hand and helps her pace the halls, with his other arm around her back. Keith is at her other side, his arm around her, too. She laughs at them for as long as she can between contractions. Labor can last for hours, and it's good for her to walk. So she walks, and she rambles, and they listen to her while they wait for Lance to get back with her things.

It _does_ last hours. Doctors flit in and out of the room, giving updates that go in one ear and out the other, as long as they aren't _concerned_ about anything.

Eventually they are ushered out of the delivery room except for Lance and Coran, and they all sit in the tidy row of seats in the waiting room. Keith is hunched over in his seat, his head in his hands, and Shiro does not quite comprehend why this is making him so anxious, but he rubs his back anyway.

Maybe it's whatever he knows about being a mix of human and alien, and the complications that can come from that. Maybe it's that he didn't have enough extended family to have ever been through a situation like this before. The miracle of life is beautiful, but on some level Shiro still understands how hard it is to watch someone you care for be in so much pain, helpless to do anything about it. Keith had looked close to crying each time Allura had let out a whimper.

"I thought they would have, like, some weird Altean thing for this," Pidge comments, from Keith's other side. Her knees are pulled to her chest, her toes curled over the edge of her seat and her shoes on the floor below.

"What, like… Laying eggs instead of giving birth?" Hunk asks.

Pidge smacks him in the arm. "Not biologically. I'm talking tech. Like, the concept of healing pods is ridiculous enough that it's not totally crazy to think they'd have some kind of… Like…"

Keith finally straightens up in his seat, leaning back. He is gently pinning Shiro's arm between his back and the chair, but Shiro does not point this out because it does not hurt. Keith arches an eyebrow and his voice is almost flat enough to sound truly at ease. "Like a birthing pod?"

"That sounds weird, somehow," Hunk says.

"It's not like we have access to a lot of Altean tech," Matt points out. "Not after losing the castle. So even if that _was_ a thing, it's kind of moot."

Romelle chimes in from where she is standing, leaning against the wall. "There is technology to assist with complications, but it isn't standard… Something so natural doesn't require much. Especially since Alteans are able to change our forms with relative ease. What do you–"  
  
"–Please don't ask for a sex ed lesson," Hunk pleads, and Romelle reluctantly drops the subject.

"I think we're the ones asking for sex ed," Keith says, relaxing against Shiro's palm.

"I mean, if you're looking for a practice partner–" Matt begins, but when Shiro shoots him a warning look, immediately cuts himself off. He doesn't quite understand why Matt looks as frightened as he does.

Keith glances over to Shiro with a raised eyebrow, arching his spine away from Shiro's touch. Quiet and curious, he murmurs, "You okay?"

"Fine," Shiro says, unsure of why Keith is asking.

Keith stares at him, unconvinced, but it doesn't last long. After another moment he leans to the side, dropping his head to rest on Shiro's shoulder and exhaling.

***

The doctors seem distressed by how many of them flood into the room as soon as they are allowed. At the very least, uncomfortable with it. But it's like Hunk had said – they're all a bit touchy feely, these days. There is no way Allura's daughter, the first Altean born on Earth, wouldn't be greeted by _all_ of Team Voltron right away.

If Shiro is honest, he was probably even more nervous than the doctor about the prospect of each of them taking turns holding a newborn. Thankfully, she can't be talked out of Coran's arms, and so the group of them all settle close to Allura's bedside, holding conversation with their eyes set on Amalthea.

"Like the unicorn?" Hunk asks.

"Like the moon of Jupiter?" Pidge asks.

"Mythology," Lance tells him, far too sincerely. He is not at all in the right mindset for their usual bantering and obnoxiously circular conversations. He is just looking at Allura, hopelessly in love as he holds her hand.

Shiro expects Keith to make a quip about being surprised that Lance even knows any Greek myths, but it doesn't happen. Beside him, Keith is quiet, still leaning against Shiro's arm with his whole body. He looks tired.

Shiro is sure that it's nothing compared to how Allura feels, but he's still relieved when they are dismissed, just for the comfort of knowing Keith will finally relax.

The evening air is refreshing after so long in the medical wing. Chilly and windy, but soothing, and Keith's body against him still feels warm. Keith's arm is wrapped around his as they walk, slow and meandering, avoiding going straight back to their rooms.

"Parents are amazing," Keith murmurs. Shiro is afraid to glance down. If he does, he will have to admit the position that they are in. Admit that they are on an evening stroll, arm in arm like a pair of lovers.

"Even Lance?" Shiro teases, to distract himself.

Keith makes a show of pretending to consider this. Then laughs and shakes his head. "Even Lance," he says. "But to be fair, Allura is in the lead right now."

"Any of this make you decide if you want kids?"

Keith smiles, subdued but amused "Didn't clear things up in the slightest. But… I think that's fine. And I think that's the kind of thing you would figure out with a partner, anyway."

"It's a good thing to know about yourself before things get serious. And about your partner." Shiro means to leave it at that. He really does. But the breeze blows and his heart slows, and he adds, "Sometimes when you love someone, it still relies on context."

Keith is quiet. Then: "I don't know if I believe that. When you love someone, you love them."

"Of course. But… If you love someone and there's something about their circumstances that makes them incompatible with you – if you love someone, and they don't want the same things as you… That isn't always something that you can work out."

"Adam?" There is no judgment in his voice.

"Sort of," Shiro admits. "It's just not sustainable to love someone when the context of your lives don't line up into something cohesive. If you want different things, or your own lives are going to keep you apart, or keep you from being what each other needs… Even if you're in love, if your lives are incompatible, it's not something you can just power through. If distance is a factor, that may not have anything to do with a person's personality and the reasons you fell in love with them. But it'll change how you can interact. It'll change whether that love can stay, or grow."

Keith is staring up at the stars with an unreadable expression, his lips in a thin line. There is something he wants to say, but he is not saying it, and Shiro does not know how to ask. 

As the silence stretches, it only grows more comfortable, its awkward introduction slowly left behind. The conversation falls behind them.

Shiro watches the wind blow Keith's hair out of his face as they walk. It's a tangled mess after the day, made worse by the weather, but it's nice to be able to really look at him without his bangs falling in his eyes. He watches Keith's chest rise and fall with each deep breath, like he is doing everything he can to take in the moment and enjoy it.

Shiro is aware of every time Keith's fingers twitch around his arm. Aware of each time Keith's body sways just a little bit heavier into Shiro's side.

He is aware of how damning this silence is.

But he is choking on the words, struggling and swimming against a current that doesn't want to take this moment away. Some of his best friends have just had a baby, and Keith is here, tucked against his side.

Shiro cannot decide if he is avoiding talking about how they've definitely lost the bet, or if he is avoiding talking about how he is definitely in love with Keith.

He cannot muster the courage to say anything before Keith slips away from him with a smile and a "Good night, Captain."

***

All his work from the previous day had gone untouched, and so the first time Shiro sees Keith, it is well into the afternoon.

From the opposite side of Shiro's desk, Keith says, "Oh, Allura says yesterday doesn't count, by the way. So the bet is still on."

"I'm surprised it even crossed her mind," Shiro says, laughing.

Keith cracks a grin, too. "They're keeping her in bed until tomorrow morning, but Romelle says she's impatient and bored out of her mind. So that's probably got something to do with it."

Shiro nods, laughs again, and then drifts into silence.

He is watching Keith closely, as if he could see into him. As if he could just _force_ open the mind-meld that happens in the lions and see into his head. The fact that they broke the bet has been put into words now, presented to the universe in the middle of Shiro's office. But it isn't just that, is it? It's a declaration that they walked, arm in arm.

Maybe that was nothing, to Keith. Shiro still wonders what words had died before they reached his lips. He thinks about the night he was drunk and the vaguest of memories, the distant realization coming to him that Keith knew about the real betting pool and lied. His mind can't make sense of that revelation, like he's holding the final puzzle piece but it just doesn't fit into the only open slot.

His body feels like it is vibrating in place, tingling and faintly numb with the longing to touch Keith again. He had thought the bet was difficult out of habit, but God, after last night… After Keith sidled up against him so comfortably… Shiro wishes the bet were over, wishes Allura weren't so amused by it.

"I'm going to visit her," Keith says, crossing the room to leave. "You should too, in the next hour or two."

"I will."

"Promise? If you get caught up in work and–"  
  
"–I promise, I promise. Believe me, I know what it's like to be bored out of my mind in a hospital bed."

Keith frowns. "Alright," he says, hovering by the door.

"Alright," Shiro echoes.

Keith hesitates for a moment longer, but Shiro cannot think of a good excuse for him to stay. It's only dangerous if he does. The longer he is in arms reach, the more likely Shiro is to cave in and touch him. It doesn't help that 'arms-reach' means a very different thing to Shiro's prosthetic hand than it does to most people.

Keith leaves his office, the automatic doors sliding open and closed for him. Idly, Shiro watches him through the window to the hall; watches him as he pauses just outside the door, shoulders heaving with a deep sigh. Shiro knows the feeling.

When Keith crosses in front of the window, his gaze drifts back into the room, locking instinctively with Shiro's.

They exchange amused smiles through the glass. Shiro breaks eye contact first, self consciously trying to look busy and shuffling loose papers on his desk.

_Tap, tap._

Shiro looks back up to find Keith a step closer to the window, one hand raised up to rap on its pane. Shiro blinks, but obediently crosses his office to stand by the window.

Keith watches him from the other side of the glass, eyes softening. Shiro feels as if his senses have been on fire during this stupid bet. As if, lacking touch, his body has dedicated itself to hearing Keith, to smelling him, to seeing him. Now he's had a taste again, in his dream, and against his side.

Keith opens his hand, pressing his palm flat against the glass. He mouths _Sorry, janitors._

Shiro chuckles. He mimics the motion. Slowly, he flattens his hand over Keith's.

A small part of him wants to break the glass. No, maybe not that dramatic. He wants to rush from the room and touch Keith, wants to wrap his arms around him. Or maybe even just this. Maybe even just press their palms together.

He does not realize that he is leaning forward until Keith has mirrored that movement. Head bowed, eyes shut, Keith leans forward until his forehead knocks light against the window pane.

With the glass between them, it's easy not to think about the position. He stays this way, feeling the cool window against his forehead and staring at Keith's relaxed expression.

Keith's eyes flutter open. Their eyes meet again, close, close – close enough to kiss, if not for this window. Just as the thought occurs to Shiro, Keith's eyes blow wide and he jerks back, face flushed. He looks mortified, and after a moment of staring, makes a hasty retreat.

Shiro blinks after him. 

***

Amalthea has bright pink markings on her cheeks, and the glow of them pulses against her dark skin as she sleeps. Her breathing is comfortingly even, and Shiro cradles her in his arms, marveling at the universe's ability to create such a single pin-point of awe.

"She likes you," Allura murmurs.

Shiro laughs lightly, then worries if the rumble of his chest might disturb the baby's sleep. She is warm, through her lavender blankets and his jacket. (It had been an alarming temperature, until Lance had assured him that Alteans naturally run hotter than humans.)

"I don't think she has much of an opinion on me, yet. Except maybe that I'm a comfortable bed."

"Comfortable is a fine and honorable thing to be," Allura tells him, with utmost sincerity.

And so, their quiet is comfortable.

Shiro feels the warmth and the weight of Amalthea, and he feels her breathing in and out against him. He feels like he could explode with all the love in the universe for this tiny person who he knows nothing about. God, is this what it would be like?

He tries to remind himself that babies cry, that babies are so much more work than he is seeing right now.

It's probably just the magic, he tells himself. There is Altean magic in him, now. Not in his blood, but in him nonetheless, weaving and mingling with her magic in this small room.

Shiro has had complicated relationships with his own limbs for the past couple of years, because they haven't always _been_ his own, have they? The Galra arm that was something-good-from-a-bad-thing. Then… Less good. After that, he'd spent time with only one arm, and that had been hard, but a part of him had resigned himself to it, almost with relief.

And then his Altean arm. He loves it, he does. It's a part of him, the same way Atlas breathes in his mind. It's just _different_ , that's all. It's something big and comforting and magical. Something unsuited to fighting, not like his Galra arm had been.

It's also not entirely suited to paperwork.

He's grown accustomed to doing things with his flesh and blood arm, sometimes as if his Altean arm is not there at all.

Even now, he realizes that he is skimming emails on his tablet, smoothly propping it up against his knee, holding one corner with his middle finger as his thumb navigates the screen.

Shiro thinks about how easy it is to hold Amalthea. About how big his hand is. He remembers reading a children's book in elementary school, and every illustration was full of hands. Big, loving, tender hands. This is the first time that has popped into his head in a long, long time.

"I think you'd be a natural," Allura says, eventually.

Shiro laughs lightly and plays dumb. "A natural what?"

"Father."

Shiro does not know how to reply to this.

Allura does not give him the chance anyway. The way she speaks is definite, with no room for argument or even deflection. "But I suppose you're not ready to settle down yet," she says. "It's only a matter of time before we return to the stars for just a little more adventure, isn't it?"

***

It is the last day of the bet, and Shiro does not know how he gets _any_ work done at all.

He has been preoccupied for weeks, but this has to be the worst day yet. He is jittery in his seat, constantly glancing up out his office window. He can hardly read through a single page in one sitting, and more than once he has completely failed to answer his ringing phone.

He is waiting on the edge of his seat for Keith to need something from him. For an excuse to see him today. To touch him, finally, _finally_.

A part of him worries about this; his own desperation to touch Keith, suddenly contextualized. His love is an unflattering spotlight on his own behavior.

Keith does not message him all day, does not visit his office, and so, left with no other choice, Shiro finally settles into actually working.

He doesn't realize the time until Keith is announcing it to him, shutting the door behind himself as he enters. "It's like midnight. What do you think you're doing?"

Shiro does not want to admit that he is making up for a completely wasted morning. He sets down his pen and shrugs. "Overtime?"

"Well, stop. It's late, you need to get dinner, and you shouldn't go straight to bed after work. It's depressing."

"Can't argue with that," Shiro admits. He stands up, circling his desk.

They regard each other in silence for a long moment.

Shiro has churned it over in his mind a thousand times. What their first touch will be. Maybe fingertips. Maybe Keith's shoulder; maybe a hand at his back. Maybe he really will brush the hair from his cheek, or from his throat as Keith swallows, and his Adam's apple bobs, but probably he will not.

He hadn't considered the possibility of Keith crashing into him, wrapping his arms around him and burying his face in Shiro's collar.

For a moment Shiro is startled frozen. Then, tentatively, he wraps his arms around Keith in return. He feels the deep breath Keith takes. He feels the warmth of the exhale and shivers. Keith is warm and solid. A firm weight with a tight grip.

"Sorry," Keith says, muffled but not drawing back. "I'll be good. I'll be normal in a minute. Just – a minute."

"You don't need to be normal," Shiro murmurs back. "I'm fine with this. I like this. I'm glad."

Keith breathes in deep again. Shiro feels Keith's fingers curling into the back of his jacket.

When Keith draws back, it is only a slight lean. Their hips are still aligned. His hands leave Shiro's back only to come cup his cheeks carefully.

Shiro's heart stutters. He feels his face heating and wonders if Keith can feel it under his thumbs as they trace over Shiro's cheekbones. He doesn't touch and look at Shiro as if he's trying to memorize him, but as if he is relieved to get exactly what he expected.

They're so close. Keith's face is marked and beautiful, framed by dark hair. All Shiro would have to do is lean down, just a little bit. Keith's lips are parted soft. Inviting. Almost like – almost as if he really _is_ inviting Shiro to kiss him.

There is a brief terror that crashes over Shiro's mind; that if he's wrong, he might lose this again, only permanently. But with the other end of the scale tipped with kissing Keith, even if only once, it seems worth the risk.

He is about to give in, about to close his eyes, about to lean down. His eyes flutter shut, and then–

–Keith jerks back. Just one step, his hands flying off of Shiro, then just as quickly setting his palms flat against his chest as if to hold him at a distance. Or as if drawn back by magnetism.

When Shiro opens his eyes, Keith's face is flushed, eyes intent on staring at his own hands.

"That was… Sorry. I shouldn't have."

"You didn't do anything," Shiro points out, somewhere between numb and confused.

"I was going to," Keith mutters.

Shiro's heart is pounding. He touches Keith's hand, marveling at how easy it is, how wonderful. Keith is warm; the skin on the back of his hand is soft. The leather of his glove clings to the shape of him, and Shiro rubs a thumb up Keith's palm.

Keith shivers, letting Shiro guide his hand. Letting him slide it over his heart. Shiro watches him, watches the recognition settle on his face as he feels Shiro's heart drum staccato for himself.

"I want you to," Shiro says, quiet.

"Really?" Keith asks with a soft unsurety. "I keep thinking you do, but… It's hard to believe that. I know that it would be crazy to be like… Like we are. And not mean it. But…"  
  
He is skirting around the words. Trying to hold onto plausible deniability if something goes wrong, if Shiro rejects him. Shiro can't fathom it.

"I love you," Shiro says. "I'm in love with you."

Keith does not fluster or blush. He just smiles, a wide smile that slowly takes over his whole face. His lips curl, and his eyes light up, and his arms are on Shiro's, holding him under the forearms. Shiro feels as if the room is slipping away, as if all that's left in the universe is Keith holding him, and his hands finding Keith's waist.

The world is only fading until Keith leans up on his toes and tentatively presses his lips to Shiro's. Then it is _gone_. Shiro's eyes flutter shut and it's just the dark of space and Keith's body against his. The warm and wet of his mouth, and the small shuddery breath he takes without drawing away. The sensation of squeezing him, pulling him flush and feeling how small he is against Shiro's body.

They kiss, and they kiss, and Shiro does not know how long this goes on. When they part he feels dizzy. Short of breath, his lips spit-slick, his face flushed. Keith looks to be in the same condition, blinking at him owlish and starry-eyed.

They need to leave the office, Shiro thinks, distantly. But Keith's hands are back on his chest, sliding up his jacket with a curiosity. As if he needs to remember the sensation, as if he's afraid it will be taken away again. Shiro lets him reach all the way up to his throat, where Keith's warm hands slide up his neck. His breath hitches, and there's something dark in Keith's eyes as his thumbs trace over, pressing just lightly enough that he must feel the way Shiro's breath goes shallow.

It fills Shiro with a familiar hunger, and he squeezes Keith's hips again, marveling at how close his hands come to being able to touch fingertips around him. He watches Keith's eyes dart downward as if acutely noticing the same thing. A blush blooms up on Keith's cheeks.

"We need to go," Keith says in a stilted voice.

"Right," Shiro says, making no move to detach from him.

It takes a long moment before either of them makes a move. In the end, Shiro concedes to holding Keith's hand, walking with him back to his quarters.

When Keith draws away, he falters. Keith hesitates outside the door. "Can I stay the night with you?"

Shiro must be quiet for a moment too long, because Keith flushes red all over again. He can't even imagine what his own expression looks like.

"Not for… I just mean to sleep, for now."

Shiro nods mutely. He isn't disappointed. He still has the visceral memory of a daydream behind his eyes, but he knows it would be too soon.

But now he also knows that Keith was thinking it, too.

_For now_.

So for now, he is satisfied with this. With the relief of not having to let go of Keith's hand as soon. With watching Keith strip down into his underwear, somehow completely unabashed until he is tugging on oversized sleep-clothes of Shiro's and climbing into bed beside him.

He is satisfied with the warm of their bodies that fit together like puzzle pieces. Like they were made for each other.

***

Shiro often wakes throughout the night. He can't place when it started. Can't remember if it was always this way. Sometimes he feels as if he left for Kerberos as one person and came back as another - or like he is the center of a Venn diagram with his past self as one circle and the clone in another, but can't determine _what_ , exactly, rests in the overlap and what rests outside of it.

The sky is still a deep dark. Keith's expression is smoothed out in sleep, relaxed and comfortable. His hair falls in his face, and Shiro reaches out to tuck it behind an ear without a thought. It's only after he's done it that he realizes how many times that impulse had struck him throughout the bet.

It's a small thing, but it makes him laugh under his breath.

Keith's eyes blink open, and he squints at Shiro is confusion for just a moment. Then a smile spreads slow and warm on his face.

"Sorry," Shiro murmurs. "Did I wake you up?"

"No," Keith lies.

Shiro laughs again. It's easy to, and it pushes back at the anxiousness that he had hoped the end of this bet would completely erase. But of course it's still there. Of course it is.

They lay in the dark together, and Shiro's hand seeks out Keith's. They lace their fingers together wordlessly, and then Shiro closes his eyes to go back to sleep. He intends to; he doesn't want to keep Keith up, either. It's still the middle of the night and it's no time for the long talks that feel as if they are poised and ready, lying in wait.

He doesn't know how long passes before he hears Keith exhale, feels his hand tense for just a second.  
  
"Sorry," Keith whispers.

Shiro opens his eyes to look at him, startled to see just how far away that smile has slipped. Keith's brow is furrowed, his expression scrunched up. He looks frustrated, not meeting Shiro's eyes.

"For what?"

Keith's voice is still scratchy and rough with sleep. He stares up at the ceiling over the bed, and it's almost like the purple of his eyes is glowing. "This. Before I leave. You even talked about how much you didn't want this. You _told_ me you don't want this, and…"

"I want this," Shiro interjects, although he does not understand the rest of what Keith is saying. He can at least correct that. He _needs_ to at least correct that.

Keith's shoulders relax, but not enough for Shiro's liking. "Sure," Keith concedes, "but…"  
  
He is quiet too long, and eventually Shiro prompts, "What are you thinking, Baby?"

Keith's hand twitches again; his lips twitch too. Shiro can't tell if it was an averted smile or a frown. "Circumstances," is all he says, gesturing vaguely with his free hand, as if an explanation is in the air above them.

Shiro stares at the space too, searching there, because Keith's expression isn't giving him answers.

"I'm leaving with the Blades," Keith clarifies. "I'm not staying here. I'm useless down here, I'm not – I'm just not cut out for this kind of work. But you are, I guess, and you're… Not like me. You're conditional."

Oh, Shiro thinks. So he isn't the only one between them, hyper-aware of the looming future that hasn't shifted out of their way. It's true that Keith isn't great for all the paperwork in politics. The red tape is already a problem and Shiro knows that despite all their best efforts, it's only going to get worse. That's the nature of things, and Keith hates it, hates obstacles in the way of what he sees as common sense.

It's true that Voltron isn't needed; that they mostly exist as a figurehead for the coalition. It's true that Keith is still with the Blade of Marmora, and it's true that they are leaving the Earth.

Long distance across states is one thing. Long distance across stars is another.

But what Shiro can't move past is – "Are you saying that you're unconditional? _"_

Keith turns to look at him, and even now Shiro can't help but admire his sharp jawline. But his eyes are sharp, too, as if he's disappointed in Shiro for even asking.

He doesn't explain in words. He opens his mouth like he wants to, and Shiro imagines all the things that he could say. All the different times and different ways that he's already proved it. It feels like a hundred times that he's saved Shiro, found Shiro, been hurt for Shiro. Tried to die for Shiro. With Shiro. Instead of Shiro.

Part of Shiro just thinks: this is because you are young. You are young and you think that this one love is forever, that it's _it_ for you. You would collapse in on yourself like an imploding star before you would consider moving on.

So it's not surprising that Shiro even asking offends him.

He had probably thought they were on the same page.

But then what does Keith want, Shiro wonders. Does he want that sort of relationship? One where they see each other once every couple of months at the _most?_ One where, being optimistic, they could speak once or twice a week without distractions?

One where they are back to never touching each other? One where their bodies go back on edge, unfamiliar and awkward? And the warm is all eroded away until all that's left is Keith flinching when Shiro gets too close, and their conversations go quiet with nothing to close a lengthening gap. Until one day, eventually, one of them is not waiting for the other anymore, and this is not even a sad thing anymore, because it would be much worse to only wait forever.

"Sorry," Keith says again, but this time not at all apologetic. He sounds gruffer with the realization that this hasn't been resolved. He rolls away, turning away from Shiro, but does not object when Shiro curls up behind him.

Shiro pulls him close, until Keith's back is flush against his chest. He feels Keith tense, then relax, then shift until he is properly comfortable.

Shiro kisses Keith's hair and whispers, "I love you." He strokes Keith's hip with his thumb, and kisses his hair again and again, and he breathes in and out with him until Keith finally falls back asleep.

All he can think is how deeply sad it is, how little Keith would be willing to settle for.

He doesn't get back to sleep for an hour, his mind churning over his options. What he wants, and what he has, and what he could have.

***

When his alarm goes off early in the morning, Keith rolls directly on top of him to turn it off before Shiro has even opened his eyes.

But then – then Keith is on top of him, solid and firm, but still light-weight enough that it's no strain. His chest is over Shiro's abdomen, and he looks up at Shiro with strands of messy hair falling into his face, and his eyes still half-lidded.

For a moment they rest that way, Keith slowly lowering his head down onto Shiro's chest and time ticking by.

Shiro doesn't think before reaching out to cup Keith's cheek. It still feels like a treat to get to touch him again. To get to touch him like _this._ Intimately, romantically. Guiding him up gently, until Keith is straddling him and leaning down for a kiss. His hair falls down, spilling around Shiro and tickling him, and Shiro laughs softly.

Keith does too, but his smile fades first.

It's nice to have this, to have _touch_ to comfort him with. It's soothing for Shiro to feel how Keith goes limp on top of him when Shiro's hand finds the nape of his neck and rubs. The tension fights for only a moment before leaving him completely.

He's hard, but he can feel that Keith is too through the sweatpants that are barely holding onto his hips, even with the drawstrings pulled as far as they'll go. There's a comfort in this; in the way Keith does not try to hide it, does not shy away. It isn't anything worth acknowledging or ignoring. It's just a natural thing, as comfortable as if they've been together for years and years. Shiro thinks this is probably always what it would have been like.

Shiro kneads at Keith, his hand roaming from nape to shoulders, and Keith relaxes into the touch so completely that it startles him. He almost thinks that Keith has fallen back asleep until he arches back up into the touch when it slows, threatening to stop.

"Harder," Keith breathes.

Shiro tries to obey. He brings his prosthetic arm to help reach Keith's lower back at angles he can't with his flesh arm. His fingers dig into pale skin, pressing circles into it and easing out the knots.

"Press hard enough that you think it'll hurt me," Keith says, his voice muffled because he is face-down in Shiro's collar. Shiro is aware of Keith's breath against his skin and his lips dragging across him. "Then a little harder than that."

Shiro tries not to say it, really he does, but he hears himself ask, low, "You like it rough?"

He doesn't wait for an answer; he complies, massaging Keith harder. So hard that he almost worries he'll bruise. He thinks he won't get a real response out of Keith, until Keith _whimpers_ , and both of them falter for just a second. He can feel the way Keith's body tenses, then relaxes again on top of him.

Shiro resumes rubbing, and Keith buries his face in Shiro's throat.

Keith admits, "I don't know. Probably."

Shiro falters again and valiantly pretends he had not. His erection twitches, and he feels Keith shift his hips just slightly. All he can manage is: "Oh."

Then Keith's hips are moving; a slow, gentle undulation against him. Shiro can feel the hot flush spreading up his whole body as they grind together lightly, a strange mix of tension and relaxation traveling up his spine in unison. Keith's lips are on his neck, pressing kisses, slowly working his way to Shiro's jawline.

"Parting gift?" Keith murmurs, voice low. The movement of his hips more focused.

A shiver runs up Shiro's spine; his hands move down to hold onto Keith's sides, not to guide him but to feel each rise and fall as if he were.

"No, Keith," Shiro says. Keith pauses, about to draw back, but Shiro cuts the misunderstanding short as quickly as possible. "I'm never leaving you."

Keith's hair tickles him again as the younger man ducks his head with a light laugh. "I'm the one that's leaving."

"Let me come with you."

This time Keith sits upright. The slide of his weight over Shiro's cock is distracting; the sight of him almost too good to think straight.

But he's frowning.

"Sorry," Keith says, like he is carefully piecing the sentence together in his head before he speaks. "I shouldn't have phrased it that way. I'm not trying to make it a guilt thing."

Shiro shakes his head. "It isn't a guilt thing. I want to come with you."

The clarity of it is daunting.

Keith is at a loss for words, lips pursed.

"It isn't as if I'd be excommunicated from the Earth. I'm sure that even if I leave with you, my role will be multifaceted. Yours is. Nothing is separate anymore, that's the point of coalitions." Shiro pauses, a thought occurring to him. "Unless… I wouldn't be able to come with you?"

"No, I'm sure everyone would be happy to have you… If anything, it might help with the recruitment efforts to have a human with us instead of just the galra and us half-breeds."

Shiro's mouth pulls thin, but before he can say anything, Keith waves him off.

"I know, I know. Anyway, I just… Don't want you to make a decision you'll regret. Just for…"

"Just for you?"

Keith gives a single nod, his gaze slicing away to look at the wall.

"All of life is just choices, Keith. Yes, it's important to know what you want and not make sacrifices against your own happiness, but there are in-betweens. I can weigh my choices and decide that you're worth it — because going back out there? Seeing more worlds, helping more people, but _directly_ , with my own hands? That's not a _sacrifice_. That's just a different choice."

"You decide all this just now?" Keith asks, looking back to him with an amused smile. Shiro doesn't like the way his shoulders sag, like he's resigned himself to the disappointment of Shiro walking back this decision, later.

"Yeah," Shiro says, honestly.

Keith looks down at him. The moment is uncomfortable, almost awkward. He can see Keith running calculations in his head, like he's determining whether or not he trusts Shiro's spur of the moment decision or not.

"Everything we have, we fell into. You aren't pulling me away from a job I worked my whole life dreaming of. It's just what I landed with. Let me choose something else when the situation changes."

Keith takes in a deep breath, and his whole body shifts. Shiro watches his back arch, then the fall of his chest as he exhales.

"Fine," he says.

Shiro smiles brightly. "No take-backs."

Shiro imagines that it's too much for Keith to fully process right now. First thing in the morning, the change that he's been working himself up against for weeks. It's no surprise that he tries to brush past it.

"You should get up for work," Keith says, and makes to climb down off of Shiro. It's too easy to hold him in place at the waist.

"I mean," Shiro says innocently, "I'm quitting anyway. I can come in a little late."

Keith hums, obediently relaxing his weight on top of Shiro again. "I don't know, that reflects pretty poorly on your work ethic. Now I don't know if I even want you as a partner with the Blades."

Shiro frowns, but only for a moment before Keith's laughter makes him break into a smile, too.

For a moment, Shiro just admires the stripes of light breaking in through his blinds, crossing over Keith's arm and half his chest. He admires the way his borrowed T-shirt hangs off one shoulder, and how natural Keith feels on his lap and in his bed.

God, it's absurd that he had to deliberate over the decision at all.

Shiro asks, "Can I touch you?"

"You don't have to ask."

**Author's Note:**

> 3) I used the iOS Text Message Work Skin made by [ CodenameCarrot, La_Temperanza](https://archiveofourown.org/works/6434845/)! How fun!!
> 
> 4) Anyway thank you for reading. I hope that you are staying safe and healthy.


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